Its intellectually lazy to just cry "cherry pick" instead of attempting to figure out the relationship between crime and legal gun ownership. The fact that all violent crime decreased does absolutely nothing to invalidate the statistics.

Since you are not disputing the figures, then what exactly are you arguing against?

I am arguing it is wrong to take a fact in isolation and then use that fact to prove a wider point. For example arguing gun control does not work by point out how people suffer from gun attacks in a given time period.

You have to look at the wider picture. Did any contributing factors change during the period in question.

Yes - resolution of gun related homicides have crashed from nearly 70 percent to under 20 percent during the same period.

Yes - Access to firearms outside the control area remain unchanged.

See what I did there - I used facts to understand why gun control in an area are failing, rather than just deciding the law is flawed.

No i didn't see what you did there at all?

You said the data was cherry picked, and then confirmed that violent crime decreased while gun ownership increased.

All that tells you is action needs to be national. DC is sandwiched between 3 states and an easy drive to several more. Gun reform is meaningless in isolation like that.

And 4 States border Mexico, another dozen or so border Canada, Florida is a dinghy ride away from Cuba...

What do you do about these instances? Enforce an international gun control program?

I am not trying to throw up road blocks just for the sake of it. I'm trying to illustrate that this is something beyond the ability of most governments to handle by passing domestic legislation.

And then what do you make of the statistics that show a decrease in gun crime while gun ownership went up in that same time period?

Come on now... International borders are a completely different proposition to state borders.

You mean overall or in DC? Any number of reasons, not least the incredibly high incarceration rates, more effective policing, the incredibly high starting point for homicide rates. I don't see how a direct correlation between increased gun ownership can be made.

Even in 2015 though the US rate was 4.88 per 100,000. In Austria it was 0.51, Australia 0.98, Ireland 0.64... Rates may have dropped but by Western standards it's appalling.

Arguing a case for persons to be able to have a large cache of and/or carry firearms in first world countries is about the most ridiculous thing that I can think of. On par with those proposing a fence to keep their gardeners, housekeepers and cheap labourers out.

You are using one "madman" to disagree with those arguments, the discussion is about gun control, not one isolated incident.

So if the proposals don't stop this madman, then what is the point? Passing gun laws so people feel good about themselves, or passing gun laws that actually reduce numbers of people dying?

Bearing in mind we are dealing with the USA, where it is a legal right for a person to own a weapon. So saying 'lets ban guns' is not a realistic proposal.

And also bearing in mind the statistics show that there is no strict correlation between tougher gun control and gun/violent crime, then what specific proposals would work?

I am not some gun nut who thinks people should walk down the streets with bazookas strapped to their shoulders, i am genuinely interested in what people think would work, because i haven't heard what the so-called magic bullet is to solve this issue.

Just because it doesn't stop this one madman does not mean that it wouldn't stop others or make it much harder for criminals to get hold of guns. You pass laws that reduce the chance of these things happening, laws that limit the number of weapons in the market and also int the black market. Many illegal guns were once legal, if there are less legal guns then less of these legal guns would transfer into the black market and into the hands of criminals. The less guns on the black market than the higher the cost of those guns as there is a shift in supply and demand thus making hit harder for people to purchase those guns and maybe it limits the amount of guns they can purchase.

You close loopholes in background checks, that allow people to buy guns without even the proof of id, you make private sales more difficult, you allow a national gun registry that includes being able to store that information digitally so a owner of a gun used in a crime can be identified easily (there are laws in the us that prohibit the creation of a gun owner registry)

There is no magic bullet, but there are things that can be implemented to make these sorts of actions less likely. This is not about stopping this one Madman as you called him, this is about reducing the impact guns are having on a society.

The problem America has created for itself is that of creating a gun culture, which they have had from day dot. Control won't work for several reasons. One is that there are over 300 million guns in circulation, cataloging them all is impossible based on their registration records, or lack thereof. They don't have a licencing system like we do, where every gun sold is legally registered and recorded. Trying to back capture that amount of data...good luck. Secondly, the government has too many hurdles to clear, the NRA among one of them, in order to introduce any legislative change regarding gun control. As much as the US needs some sort of control, I cannot realistically see them doing anything about it. It would be like finding a vaccine to cure cancer.

The problem America has created for itself is that of creating a gun culture, which they have had from day dot. Control won't work for several reasons. One is that there are over 300 million guns in circulation, cataloging them all is impossible based on their registration records, or lack thereof. They don't have a licencing system like we do, where every gun sold is legally registered and recorded. Trying to back capture that amount of data...good luck. Secondly, the government has too many hurdles to clear, the NRA among one of them, in order to introduce any legislative change regarding gun control. As much as the US needs some sort of control, I cannot realistically see them doing anything about it. It would be like finding a vaccine to cure cancer.

I think you're right on both fronts. The cultural problem is massive and it's not something that can be fixed quickly. If they can't change the culture they'll never get the political will to make any serious changes around gun laws and accessibility. It's also hard to see how the cultural change can even begin to happen. It would require a long term plan and long term commitment and politics just isn't a long term game these days. Any initiatives aimed at cultural change would be heavily railed against by the NRA and gun lobbyists generally. They're in a huge mess...Still, they need to start doing something about it.

As an Australian living in the US, the strangest thing I see with gun control is this ingrained fear that unless the population is armed, the government will run riot and oppress everyone.

They genuinely seem to fear their government. I explain in Australia, a government gets too big for its boots or pisses Australians off, we get a new government.

I will say though, Americans do have a real passion for hunting. And boy there is a lot to hunt here. On the other hand hunters dont seem to be generally the people behind this crazyness that erupts on a regular basis.

As an Australian living in the US, the strangest thing I see with gun control is this ingrained fear that unless the population is armed, the government will run riot and oppress everyone.

They genuinely seem to fear their government. I explain in Australia, a government gets too big for its boots or pisses Australians off, we get a new government.

I will say though, Americans do have a real passion for hunting. And boy there is a lot to hunt here. On the other hand hunters dont seem to be generally the people behind this crazyness that erupts on a regular basis.

As an Australian living in the US, the strangest thing I see with gun control is this ingrained fear that unless the population is armed, the government will run riot and oppress everyone.

They genuinely seem to fear their government. I explain in Australia, a government gets too big for its boots or pisses Australians off, we get a new government.

I will say though, Americans do have a real passion for hunting. And boy there is a lot to hunt here. On the other hand hunters dont seem to be generally the people behind this crazyness that erupts on a regular basis.

So go figure.

Hunters don't need semi automatic rifles

How do you know??

Well, the prey does not have a gun to shoot back for a start, so no need to be able to fire more rapidly.

Exactly. There will always be people with foil hats trying to contrive a conspiracy when it's unlikely one exists. I would think an investigation of this type would take weeks or months to complete and there's little chance the general public will ever be told the full process of the killings - nor is there any need to do so.
To be concluding there's some massive cover up based on the publicly available evidence would be naive, if not foolish.Let's just see it for what it was - a tragic mass murder by a crazy person who had access to weapons which normal citizens should never have been allowed to buy.

Nothing wrong with asking questions. Especially when everyone has access to smart phones and a wealth of information at their disposal. In a time when mainstream media is dying and citizen journalism is on the rise it's a good thing people ask questions.

... and even more mis-information.

without digressing too much from the topic i would disagree. I think we live in an age where we are smarter and healthier than we have ever been in human history. Information which isn't accurate generally speaking is far less likely to be ranked by search engines such as Yahoo; Baidu; Google et al , which in turn limits traffic and increases bounce rate. Wikipedia as an example corrects any editing done on its websites within a few hours.

I can totally understand apprehension and caution with questioning media when in the 1950s you had operation mocking bird which still affects modern media.

Thats a big call - definitely healthier but the jury is out on smarter - we no longer think for ourselves or make judgements based on what we believe is right and what we feel is right - these search engines and social media have massive influence on what people believe - media and govts control what information is released and unfortunately a lot of people fail to question the idiocy of what they are being told.

As an Australian living in the US, the strangest thing I see with gun control is this ingrained fear that unless the population is armed, the government will run riot and oppress everyone.

They genuinely seem to fear their government. I explain in Australia, a government gets too big for its boots or pisses Australians off, we get a new government.

I will say though, Americans do have a real passion for hunting. And boy there is a lot to hunt here. On the other hand hunters dont seem to be generally the people behind this crazyness that erupts on a regular basis.

All that tells you is action needs to be national. DC is sandwiched between 3 states and an easy drive to several more. Gun reform is meaningless in isolation like that.

And 4 States border Mexico, another dozen or so border Canada, Florida is a dinghy ride away from Cuba...

What do you do about these instances? Enforce an international gun control program?

I am not trying to throw up road blocks just for the sake of it. I'm trying to illustrate that this is something beyond the ability of most governments to handle by passing domestic legislation.

And then what do you make of the statistics that show a decrease in gun crime while gun ownership went up in that same time period?

Come on now... International borders are a completely different proposition to state borders.

You mean overall or in DC? Any number of reasons, not least the incredibly high incarceration rates, more effective policing, the incredibly high starting point for homicide rates. I don't see how a direct correlation between increased gun ownership can be made.

Even in 2015 though the US rate was 4.88 per 100,000. In Austria it was 0.51, Australia 0.98, Ireland 0.64... Rates may have dropped but by Western standards it's appalling.

The stats were nation wide i believe, but I'll put them aside, because i see it more as an interesting side point than a solid factor that can be relied upon in the absence of further information. When you look at the state by state information, it becomes less clear and is more dependent on things like the gang problem in each state, for example.

Back to the point i was making however... if you implement gun control, then it needs to be effective in achieving its aims. If the aim is to simply stop law abiding citizens from having guns, then that's easy, do what John Howard did.

But if the aim is to stop mass gun violence, then i am yet to hear of a gun control measure proposed that will achieve this. Even if you go to the extremes of ripping up the US Constitution and ban all guns, and secure the borders and stop guns being smuggled in, there are still over 350 million legal guns in circulation (more guns than people in the USA).

There is no easy fix, and the solutions proposed by politicians and commentators seem to be aimed at gaining twitter 'shares' and facebook 'likes', rather than looking at specific fixes.